Buoyant Carnegie in the entertainment game, says Boyce

THEY HAVE swept all before them in the Championship so far this year and Yorkshire Carnegie are on a mission to entertain, prop Lewis Boyce says.

The Headingley-based outfit will face their toughest challenge on Saturday when they visit London Irish for a battle of the top-two.

Yorkshire made it seven wins from seven in the Championship with a hard-fought 35-29 success against Jersey Reds at Headingley, when they ran in five tries.

That took their points total to 225, at an average of more than 32 per game and Boyce insisted they have set their stall out to entertain.

“We want to play good attacking rugby, especially for the fans,” he stressed.

“It is the way to play. We want to show what we can do as individuals and it will all come together as a team.

“It’s important for us to play good rugby. We don’t want to play a boring brand, we want to play an exciting style and obviously it is dangerous for other teams to play against if you are moving the ball around.”

Defensively Carnegie have been less strong, conceding 166. Jersey led twice and gained bonus points for the narrow nature of their defeat and scoring four tries.

Boyce feels there are definitely things to work on”, but he feels Carnegie are on the right lines. He added: “There are some individual errors in there, but as a system we do well so we are happy with how we are going.”

Both aspects of their game will be tested this weekend, but Boyce feels the gritty encounter with Jersey was good preparation.

“It was a tough game and fair play to Jersey, they really came at us hard,” he said. “We knew that from the start of the week, in our preparation. We knew they were a good team physically.

“We stuck that out and got the win, but hats off to them; they are a good side. Every team in this league can play. All the teams are looking to be the best they can and it’ll be a good test against London Irish.

“They have got some good individuals there. We are up at the top of the league for a reason and hopefully we can do our best and play the best we can.

“We are going to build it up. We’ll fix individuals errors and hopefully put out a good performance.”

Yorkshire have been beaten just once in nine competitive games this year, a much-changed team going down 51-35 at Ealing Trailfinders in the British and Irish Cup. Boyce feels the most encouraging aspect of their start ot the campaign is the fact they are not yet at their peak.

He said: “We just keep doing what we are doing, working hard week-in and week-out at training and hopefully it pays off for us on the pitch at weekends.

“It is still early days, but I think there’s a lot more improvement to come. There’s a great bunch of lads at Carnegie and we all stick together.

“When things go tough we get tougher.There’s a high spirit all the time and even when things are going tough we stick it out.

“The spirit of the team is awesome at the minute, so it’s going well.”

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